


the subtle grace of gravity, the heavy weight of stone

by Purple_Space_Cats



Series: choices [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Bittersweet Ending, F/M, Gay Keith (Voltron), I CRIED WHILE WRITING THIS?, Keith (Voltron)-centric, Keith and Lance could have had a thing, M/M, Pining Keith (Voltron), This is the first time my own writing has made me cry I'm lowkey proud of myself, minor language? keith says fuck a few times in his brain, no beta we die like men, only the first part tho that sappy shit it Got Me
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-24
Updated: 2019-04-24
Packaged: 2020-01-25 21:08:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,996
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18582610
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Purple_Space_Cats/pseuds/Purple_Space_Cats
Summary: “Uncle Keith, how do you know if you’ve fallen into true love?”as the evening sets in, keith has a little talk with a young boy he cares for as if he was his own son. he doesn't say some things, but alfie seems to understand them anyway.





	the subtle grace of gravity, the heavy weight of stone

**Author's Note:**

> me: disappears and doesn't update my 3 part fic for 4 months  
> also me: suddenly thrusts this at you after starting it at midnight, without any beta-ing or letting anyone read it beforehand
> 
> yeah hi im gonna finish my galtean klance fic i swear i will i swear i sw
> 
> this monstrosity has no set plot i literally just wanted to write some pining keith because i apparently really do love hurting him *shrug emoji*  
> i learned a new word for this are you proud of me mom  
> a whole new word,,,,
> 
> there's mentioned/referenced romellura but i dunno if anyone is gonna catch that big yeet

“Uncle Keith, how do you know if you’ve fallen into true love?”

The dark-haired man glanced over at the small child who sat on his couch, looking too-small into the jacket he knew that had only just been bought for him. “Why do you ask, Alfie?” He asked after a moment, voice soft as he stepped over to sit on the couch beside him.

“My Mama and Papa are always going on about true love.” The child murmured softly, fiddling with his fingers and kicking his legs a little. “And it’s in every fairy tale. True love’s kiss, true love fixing the curses… And I just- how do you _know_? What if you’re in love with someone and it’s not true love?” His little blue eyes looked up at Keith’s, meeting them steadily. His wild fawn-brown hair reminded of Keith for someone - of something - for a moment and his throat closed. He swallowed hard and glanced absentmindedly out the window.

“Come with me, Alfie.” He urged after a moment, rising to his feet and taking the small child’s hand in his own. His skin was far darker than that of the half-Galran’s, and freckled, but he didn’t bat an eyelash. “This is a grown-up topic and a grown-up talk. Can you handle it?”

Alfie nodded rapidly, and together the two stepped off of the porch and into a grassy field, speckled with stunning magenta blooms. The dark form of Kosmo plodded along behind them, but he knew well enough to know what topics were to be touched on and what were not, so he maintained an unobtrusive presence. They walked for a little while, Keith’s free hand in his pocket and Alfie’s plucking at petals as any young child was wont to do, though Keith didn’t reprimand him. By the time they stopped at a flowering cherry tree, twisting high into the sky and seemingly constantly shedding those pastel pink petals, Alfie had a handful of Juniberry petals, too. He tossed them to the ground when they reached the tree.

Keith led him to the base of the tree and together they sat, the elder’s back braced by the tree. Alfie sat down next to him, leaning heavily on him.

Afie turned to face Keith, pulling the older man’s long, dark hair over his shoulder and beginning to braid it. Ever since he’d learned, he’d been obsessed with doing it for Keith. He didn’t mind. He loved Alfie as if he was his own son.

(Some days, he longed for him to be.)

“Uncle Keith?” He repeated, prompting his answer again.

He chuckled softly at the impatience of the child, smoothing his unruly, wildly curling bangs away from his face. He was so familiar. “I’m getting to it, buddy. This is a big topic for anyone, you know.”

Alfie had finished Keith’s braid and moved to making flower crowns for the three of them by the time Keith began to answer his question.

“True love… when you’re in true love, you’ll know.” He murmured softly, ignoring the brilliantly blue eyes of the child on him for a moment. “It’s like love, but so much more. When you love someone truly, you know that person - and you accept them, for everything and everyone they are. Their flaws and their insecurities.”

Alfie watched attentively, having paused in even his flower-crown-weaving, which meant a lot for the little boy.

“It’s not just seeing them as someone who’s perfect. It’s knowing that they’re _not_ perfect and not only loving them, but wanting to be there for them. Being willing to commit to helping them be the best version of themselves that’s possible.”

He paused, breath rattling in his chest. He opened his mouth to speak again, but Alfie spoke before him.

“Are you in true love with somebody, Uncle Keith?” He murmured softly, bright eyes soft and searching.

“It depends, buddy.” He murmured, turning his gaze away so that, for a moment, Alfie wouldn’t see how his eyes stung with tears he blinked too fast to call back. “A lot of people think you can’t be in true love with someone if they don’t love you back.”

“But why? Why didn’t you tell that somebody, Uncle Keith?” He pressed, eyes wide and innocent.

“True love is loving somebody enough to know when to let them go, Alfie.” Keith turned back to the child, smoothing down his bangs again. “And being willing to let them go. Not only that, but being willing to see them happy with someone else. Being willing to stand at their side even though it hurts to see them together, even though it makes it hard to breathe when you look at them, because they’re so happy and you want to make them happy like that.”

Fuck. He wiped at his eyes with the sleeve of his jacket for a moment, taking another deep breath. Fuck, Alfie shouldn’t see him like this. He was thirty-one now, he didn’t need to be pining like this over someone.

“But- but you know that taking them away from that someone, that someone that makes them happy, would be the worst possible thing in the world for them. You want to be selfish, and you want to hold them close to you forever. You never want to let them go. But you do, because you love them too much to drag them down by forcing them to be with you when they just don’t feel the same way that you do.”

“I’m sorry.” He murmured. Keith shouldn’t be dumping all of this on him, and he knew it, Alfie was merely six. And yet he watched Keith with eyes wizened beyond his years, eyes that told him he understood everything and nothing at the same time. It troubled him, some days, but he spent enough time in Alfie’s company now that he knew that he could tell him things that most children would never understand. It seemed as if whenever Keith mentioned that there was a ‘grown-up conversation’ to be had, then a new side of Alfie Keith wasn’t even sure that his parents were aware of emerged.

It wasn’t like he’d never spoken of these things before, to his mother and his brother and close friends that had become siblings to him, to a sad lonely in the same position as he was, but Alfie... he liked listening to people. And in return, Keith listened to him, too. He listened to the middle child, feeling trapped by the expectations placed on him by his elder, stronger, ‘better’ sisters. They listened to one another, just Alfie and Keith and Kosmo and their tree.

It was a beautiful tree, for what it was worth.

“It’s not your fault.”

And it wasn’t. It was no one’s fault but his own. No one’s fault that he had gone on in silence when he could have had a chance, it was no one’s fault that he couldn’t bear to break away their friendship, it was no one’s fault that he couldn’t possibly tell the damned man he was in love with anything.

“Enough about me, Alfie.” Keith murmured eventually, offering a lopsided grin that he knew Alfie could see right through, because he never did that unless he was trying to divert the attention from himself and he _knew_ that, because Alfie somehow knew everything. “How are you doing?”

Alfie went back to weaving a flower crown for him as petals swirled around the both of them, a scenic contrast against the pastel periwinkle hues of the sky. The sky here was so… new, so different. He could tell that it was getting late, but Keith had no concerns about going home anytime soon. It wasn’t far, anyway, and he knew that Kosmo could bring them both back in the event of an emergency. There were hardly any of those anymore, though.

Not after the war, not after everything. Not after they’d settled, not after Honerva’s colony had been restored.

Not after Honerva and the first five Paladins of Voltron gave up their lives to restore Altea.

Keith had done work with the Blades for the first few years, busied himself by throwing himself into the restoration of the universe. But.. in five years, what could be done was done, and planets needed time on their own to recover. So Keith threw himself into other things. He improved his relationships with others, attended meetings he’d missed out on. Met the child born while he’d been away.

Was close enough to have their secondborn named after him.

But he loved Alfie. He loved him as if he was his own son and would sooner die than see anything happen to him.

“I’ve been… okay.” The boy eventually murmured, looking down at his lap.

Keith reached forward and squeezed his shoulder gently. “You know it’s okay to be not-okay, Alfie.” He murmured softly. “You can talk to me, and I swear on my life, I won’t tell anyone anything without your permission.”

The little boy nodded. “I just- I feel like Mellie and Rosa are always doing so much better than I am.” He murmured, curling his hands into fists in the hem of his jacket fabric, flower crown abandoned for a moment. He resumed the project when his godfather smoothed his thumbs over his knuckles, and the two shared a sad, knowing little smile for a moment.

“When I was a kid,” He murmured, and Alfie perked up, because Keith seldom spoke of his childhood, “I was friends with a boy. And he always thought that his siblings were doing so much better than he was.”

Blue eyes twinkled innocently up at Keith, and he offered him a reassuring little smile, coaxing him to go on. Those eyes were so soft, and so familiar, and sometimes it hurt to look into them. But that was okay. He was an adult now, even if he was still… what had Lance said? Emotionally constipated. He laughed more easily, he smiled more, but feelings were still very much not a _Keith_ thing.

“This boy didn’t think he was good enough to become a fighter pilot. All he’d ever wanted, ever since he was a kid old enough to know that he wanted something,.” He murmured softly, reaching a hand up and extending a hand toward the sky, fingertips stretching as if he could actually touch it. “Was to be up there.”

Alfie watched him with wide, reverent eyes.

“Well. That and to become a merman.” Keith chuckled softly, reaching down and poking him in the belly. Alfie squealed at him and burst into little giggles, but he sobered up a bit as Keith lay back, the branches of the cherry tree cutting into the darkness as the periwinkle began to fade into pthalo, and then from there to navy. Keith closed his eyes for a moment, feeling a body curl on either side of his - Alfie on one, Kosmo on the other, and he put an arm around the both of them.

“What happened to him, Uncle Keith?”

“The fighter pilot?”

“Yeah.”

“He grew up to become one of the best pilots in the universe.” Keith murmured. “He soared through stars, defended galaxies, and fell in love.”

“What happened after that?” He prodded, eyes bright and focused on Keith.

“Well, what happens when two people fall in love with each other?”

Alfie paused. “Did they get married?”

“Yes.”

He nodded very slowly, very wisely. “I think I understand now, Tio Keith.”

Keith’s smile came out a little bitter. “You’re a smart kid, Alfor.”

* * *

After all that they’d been through, Keith had always been the moon, and Lance had always been the Earth. Allura was the sun that nurtured the Earth, that had supported it, that had seen it bloom. The Earth was the sun’s true love. 

The moon had no place in that but to watch over the little stars that formed as a result of their brilliant glow.

**Author's Note:**

> there's a whole ass deleted scene i may end up posting as a second chapter if this does well,,,,,, but i dunno  
> also alfie's name is alfor yorak mcclain and keith is his godfather so do with that what you will  
> rosa and mellie are his sisters, rosaline and melenor


End file.
